Gratitude and Comfort
by BlueNynaeve
Summary: Nicky and Kirill have been partners on the run.  A panic attack the day before her birthday prompts a change in their relationship.  Nicky/Kirill PWP
1. Gratitude and Comfort

She leaned against the white-tiled counter in their small kitchen, unable to think past the wide-eyed silent stand-off Kirill had just ended. They had just come in from their daily game of hide and seek, an excercise she had learned from David Webb during Treadstone and that she and Kirill had been playing near dusk since the first town they had stayed for more than a week. That was seven months ago and this was the third nondescript cottage, ninth place total, they had stayed in.

Normally after the game she would immediately start an evening meal while Kirill set up security measures around their space. Breakfast was Kirill's job while she checked for any news that might indicate pursuit and planned their next move. The middle of day was dedicated to physical training, mapping the area, and any other research they might want to do. Tonight she could not think what to make, let alone gather enough focus to push off the counter and begin.

Neither talked much and not only because Kirill's English was thickly accented enough to preclude easy dialogue and she was still pretending that she understood only a few basic Russian phrases. When they did speak, they used French or Spanish, occasionally German, to coordinate housework or schedules or the business of hiding. They both had too many secrets to view any stories shared anything but a dangerous tie or colored by lies. So conversations were mostly functional, necessary interactions to share immediate facts and plans. Any other discussions had been mutually avoided since Kirill's painful, halting confession of confused assassin's guilt stemming from when Bourne had mercifully let him go in Moscow and Bourne's own cryptic request to keep Nikki safe. That request had likely been to assuage Bourne's own guilt in dragging her into his never-ending cycle of conspiracy and redemption.

Despite their lack of dialogue, they both had enough training in tactics to have clicked easily as a team after only a few days on the run. And while both continued to be wary of the other, most mutual regard was fairly comfortable, anticipation of the other's movements in the dance two people do when in close quarters and not a deep searching assessment of psychological balance.

Because today during their game, just after she had left their turnaround point, it had suddenly hit her that tomorrow was her birthday. And tomorrow there would be no calls home to her mother and sister, no card from her Southern cousin and aunt, no congratulatory tweets from friends, just more of the same tension between her and her temporary guardian/partner as they tried to figure out who they were evading and why. And so she had panicked, not enough to hyperventilate and pass out, but enough to have sent her racing through the narrow twisty streets, enough to have forgotten Kirill's mock hunting in her desperation to get back to something familiar.

He had caught her after only three blocks of panicked running, immobilizing her from behind with long arms and the bulk of his body, whispering shush-shush-shush in her ear, against a brick wall in a shadowed alley. He held her in that strangely claustrophobic-comforting embrace long enough for her breathing to calm, before walking her quickly home, right arm around her shoulders, left hand entangling hers as if they were two lovers who could not bear an inch apart and not almost-strangers who simply shared a common goal of not-dying. Once he had unlocked the door and led her to the kitchen, he had left again to secure the cottage.

She painfully tracked every move he made in their small one bedroom-one bath space by sound, only moving once he went outside to finish the circuit. He returned to the kitchen to find her slumped into a chair, head propped on one hand, elbow on their tiny table. He bodily lifted her, large hands wrapped around her upper arms, manhandling her over to the sink to use the brighter work light there to check her. She stared into his searching hazel eyes for a too short eternity before his face splintered into sympathy and sadness and impatience and something else that she could not read but made her hot and needy. Somehow it was that last unintelligible emotion that made her push him away and square her shoulders. He turned away then, seemingly satisfied that he could leave her alone without further panicking, stalking off to a shower.

Once she heard him step into the shower and pull the curtain shut, she began to move her feet. This was not the first time she had felt his lust, nor her own. After all they were two young athletic people who had seen each other at their most basic day in and day out for months on end. Before she could ignore it, could let her logic subsume the attraction in the interest of survival and a precarious partnership. But tonight she did not have the energy to fight her own barely tamed panic in addition to their mutual desire. She wanted the comfort of touch, the slide of skin on skin to take herself out of her desperation with some personal intimacy. She wanted to exchange something for his careful safeguard, put them on a more balanced footing than protector and protected.

When she entered the bathroom, he looked up startled through the spray, left forearm on the tiles bracing himself upright, right hand still mid-stroke on his erect cock. She maintained eye contact as she stripped down and stepped into their surprisingly large shower in front of him, forcing him upright. When he cupped the points of her shoulders, she turned around, no longer wanting to see the myriad emotions in his eyes, readjusting her goal from gratitude and comfort to fill the void of aloneness to a quick fuck to blunt her whirling thoughts. She spread her feet apart, resting her forehead against her folded arms on the tiles above the shower knobs. She arched her back, presenting her cunt to him. In the long pause after his shocked and aroused gasp she started to feel nervous, but then his arms snaked around her torso to lightly caress her breasts and his teeth nipped at the junction of her neck and shoulder.

He leaned back again, his balls and the base of his arousal pressing into the cleft of her buttocks. He began stroking down her back, starting each stroke at the top of her shoulders, fingertips grazing over her clavicle or briefly clasping her shoulders or upper arms. The water was endlessly warm, bouncing off his chest onto her lower back, the occasional droplet hitting her upper back in syncopation with his even regular strokes. She felt herself melting, every touch of his long fingers and broad palms guiding the tension out of her body to pool in her gut.

Long minutes passed as Nicky slid past simple arousal into blinding want. She did not understand how her legs were still holding her up, her back was so limp she felt as if she hung between her arms and cheek against the tiles and her buttocks pressed against Kirill's hips, her breasts grazed the cold shower knobs with every asymmetric stroke of Kirill's hands. Her breath came in long sighing gasps, drowned out by the noise of the water. Finally Kirill's hands stopped, sliding around her body again to cup a breast and palm her mound, pulling her so that she leaned limply against him, her head on his shoulder. He leaned back so that the soft spray hit her just below her collarbones and dipped his head to delicately lick at her neck. Her legs were still slightly spread so his long fingers dipped into her slit to stroke her labia and bring her natural slickness up to her clitoris.

Kirill was just as methodical about stroking her sex as he was her back and Nikki was soon curving her hips up to add pressure to his firm-gentle touches. Her gasps were coming quicker as her climax approached. He had been softly cupping her right breast with his left hand, keeping her upright with a taut forearm across her chest, now he tweaked the nipple hard. Nikki bowed up into the pleasure-pain and then curled forward as her orgasm clenched a straight line into her gut, stronger than anything she had felt in years, let alone the miserable last few months of furtive self-relief.

Her head thudded back on his shoulder and she heard a quiet, "Okay?" in her ear, warm breath scudding over her lobe to shiver afterquakes up her body from his still hand loosely cupping and pressing the front of her mound. Nikki took a couple of deep breaths before nodding and mouthing a breathy okay in return. He shifted his right arm across her lower abdomen and bodily lifted her off her feet, spinning her so that she now faced the back of the shower away from the spray. Putting her back on her feet his hands skimmed down her arms until he grasped her palms and placed them against the tile at shoulder height. His hands then skimmed down her torso to her hips and again he lifted her off her feet. She felt him bend his knees before the thick slide of his cock into her sensitive cunt cut off all thought and drew an involuntary moan from deep in her chest.

Her toes dangled an unknown distance above the tiles - he was holding her up by her hips, fucking into her using mostly his arms and long hip rolls. He set a slow pace, punctuating every slide with a little thrust of completion, drawing gasps and further clenches of arousal. Something hotter and brighter grew out of their sliding connection, bursting from her vagina and gleaming down her legs, out thru her arms and the top of her head. Everything she was clenched around the centerpoint of his cock inside her as his moan mingled with her own.

He pounded harder and faster into her until he abruptly tightened his hands on her hips and lifted her up, depositing her back on numb feet. One more arch against her back and heat striped along her spine, soft deep-seated groan next to her ear. His hands had not loosed their death-grip on her hips, and harsh breaths sounded in her ear for at least a minute, before he let go and turned away, letting the shower sluice away the semen on her back. A second later his hands were back on her, this time with soap and a washcloth. She limply allowed him to wash her and then himself, shuffling them in and out of the spray. He shut off the water and grabbed a towel, drying off first her body and then his own before wrapping the thin terry cloth about his waist.

"Brush your teeth." His voice was low and bemused as he walked out of the bathroom. She moved to the sink, complying slowly in her dream-state. He was back a quick minute later, bare-chested in loose shorts, her pajamas draped over one arm. As she dressed, he brushed his teeth, watching her in the large framed mirror above the sink. She stood watching him while he finished, blissed out and almost asleep on her feet. When done, he took her hand and drew her to the double bed she had been using in the bedroom. He usually slept on the pullout sofa in the seating alcove next to the kitchen, but tonight when she lay down on top of the covers in the middle of the bed, she drew him down behind her, pulling his arm around her like a blanket.

He followed her easily, scooting into her back, pillowing her head on his unoccupied arm, nuzzling into the soft hair at the back of her neck. She spared a passing thought for their missed supper, but was much too relaxed to bother doing anything about it. Soon his even breathing lulled her to sleep.

A/N: This is my first fanfiction. Reviews are appreciated. I got the hide and seek game from a Jason/Nicky fanfic I read a while ago and that I am having a hard time finding. There will be more in this world, post-Bourne trilogy.


	2. The Start of a Good Day

She swam up thru Caribbean blue light, warm and happy, her skin silk-slick against her lover's hands, arousal pooling low in her body. Months of running from faceless threats, only him and his assets, her wits and contacts to keep them safe, had forged a bond of trust between the two of them. She wanted him badly, but was not sure if making their relationship sexual would make him a stronger partner or make her a pawn he could better distance himself from.

He lay her out on the warm, giving, soft grass stroking his hands down her hips and pulling apart her thighs to lap at her core. Over and over he laved her as she pushed up into his tongue, the sun striping hot across her breasts. Her climax built steadily until she tipped over the edge, his name ripping from her lips and thru her dreamscape.

"Kirill!"

Her body pulsed as her cry rang thru the small bedroom. She cringed, waking abruptly, visions of last night in the shower flooding her thoughts behind closed eyelids. She had wordlessly asked him to fuck her in thanks for saving her from her public panic attack and he had complied. Now she didn't know what to think of him, of herself, of them. Taking a deep breath, she realized she was no longer spooned in his arms as she remembered falling asleep last night. She was on her back, head and shoulders nestled into the comforter and pillow, lower body splayed with him between her legs pressing soft kisses to the inside of her thighs.

Oh, god. That was not a dream.

"Not a dream, Nee-cola."

She cracked her eyes and tipped her head up to look at him, as he propped his wet stubbled chin on one hand. He gave her a sweet smile she had never before seen on his face. Actually, she had never seen him smile at all - savage grins of satisfaction and several evil-looking smirks of amusement, yes, but no actual smiles.

"Happy Birthday, Nee-cola."

Oh. Maybe last night was turning out to be a good thing.

She tentatively smiled back, before dropping her head back on the pillow, and putting her hand out to him. He tangled his fingers with hers, squeezing lightly, rubbing his thumb gently over her knuckles. They lay there for a few minutes, breathing together in the warm morning sunlight pouring in through the wide paned window. When he dropped his head to begin softly kissing her thighs and the crease of her hip again, she tugged at his hand. He untangled their fingers and crawled up over her, pressing kisses along her hip and up her ribs, giving each nipple a quick swipe, and continuing the path of his kisses back and forth across her collarbones out to the points of her shoulders. He finally settled cheek to cheek, warm breath in her ear, elbows caging her ribs, the tip of his erection just nudging at her soft wet folds.

She put her arms around his shoulders and tickled the soft half-curls at the nape of his neck. Her hips pushed up against his. She could feel his hard, mostly hairless chest pressing firmly into her breasts, every breath sliding smooth freckled skin against pebbled nipples. When he stretched up, his lips trailing across her jaw to her own, she turned her head away, heart hurting at the thought of that final intimacy with a man she knew would eventually be ripped violently from her life.

"Inside, please."

His acquiescence sighed in her ear as his cock slid into her cunt. Her hips tipped up, pulling him deeper, as she wound her legs about his hips and her arms tighter about his shoulders. As his buttocks flexed against her calves, thrusting firmly into her in measured strokes, she pulled her body up into his - breast to chest, belly to belly, hips to hips. His hard length rekindled her arousal and she was gasping deeply within minutes. His own breath was slowly coming deeper, washing her ear in humid sensation.

He took her earlobe in his teeth and bit gently. Her whole body clenched hard around him and pulsed out of synch with his now erratic thrusts. He was gasping for air, no longer holding his weight off her torso, but trying to bury himself as deep within her as he could go with each push.

"Nee-cola!"

He pulled out right before his orgasm, spurting against her belly, the abrupt slide and emptiness provoking another climax of her own, the clench against nothing leaving her boneless, limbs sliding against salt-slick skin to lie against the bed. He slumped onto her for a few seconds before heaving himself off to the side. He reached over the edge of the bed to grab his discarded boxers to wipe them both up. She grimaced up at the ceiling, momentarily wondering how he had gotten her out of her own pajamas without waking her up. When he dropped the boxers back on the floor and relaxed on his back, she rolled up and flopped across him on her belly, head on his shoulder, right arm reaching across his chest to cup his swelling bicep. His left hand came up to stroke across her upper arm, his right teased the tips of her hair across her back.

"Thank you for taking care of me."

Deliberately misunderstanding, he rumbled "It was my pleasure. And the shower was more than adequate gratitude."

"I mean, for everything."

He breathed deeply, pausing to gather his thoughts, "Nee-cola, it is just... returning the favor."

She tried to think of what he meant. Sure, she had handled all of the logistics of lodging and travel, moving them around from town to town and country to country. But during that first attack, a surprise mugging attempt in their third month, and the panic attack last night, he had been the only thing between her and her end.

His next words echoed her thoughts. "I would have been found within the first month. I'm the brawn, you're the mind... the brains."

"So you are saying, when I lost it last night, you were just making sure you didn't lose it too."

"Yes."

She waited, expecting more explanation, something to temper the baldness of that statement, but nothing came. "I think you would be fine now without me. But maybe you are the heart too. Why are you being so kind to me?"

She had asked him once why he had saved her in a back alley of Budapest and stuck with her thru her continued flight from those trying to close all the loose ends of a conspiracy she didn't fully comprehend. It could possibly be something like Treadstone that hadn't yet been fully opened to the press. But the assassins and spies she had worked with over the years doing logistics in Paris, Berlin, Barcelona, Prague, and a dozen other cities across Europe had been from organizations she was only starting to learn the names of.

His answer had been yet another conspiracy of money and corruption rooted in Moscow and Siberian oil politics. A tale which finally gave her the details of Marie's death and the reason why Jason Bourne had shown up in Europe after a silent six months. A tale which made her rethink her own encounter with Jason in a subway station utility room and gave her a surprising respect for the man Jason was at his core, even if he didn't know who he had been when she first assessed him as David Webb. A tale which scared her with Kirill's straightforward approach to others' deaths, his acceptance of his own mortality, and his lack of ties to anyone or anything.

She knew he had saved her in Budapest as a favor to Jason in return for the mercy of his own life, what she did not understand is why he accompanied her across borders and identities. She did not know why he did not go back to the Russian mob or any of the other underworld organizations that would be happy to use him and pay him handsomely. He seemed to have an endless supply of cash in various identities, and although they had maybe used only about forty grand in Euros so far, that was more than she had in her untouched emergency fund. And still, every time she had started making plans for the next place, he had simply stated that he was going too and given her yet another account to use to pay for everything.

His reply interrupted her introspection. "I am not kind, Nee-cola."

She tensed. "So why are you still here with me?" A silent minute stretched to two, although his stroking fingers never slackened. "Now that I have 'thanked' you, are you going to leave?"

Another beat of silence, then a sigh. "I will stay with you for five months more, Nee-cola. At least one Russian government fiscal year after the election."

She pressed her face deeper into his shoulder, feeling stupid for not understanding earlier as most hits had a shelf-life for book-keeping reasons. "So next January, they will stop looking for us." That meant she was considered a lesser threat and once her hit was off the books, and whoever had wanted her dead had not been re-elected to a position with the budget for a hit.

"Next February 1st, Alexei will likely stop seeking us."

This was the first time, Nicola realized that it might not just be her this assassin was after. That maybe Kirill might have just as much reason for running as she did. That made her feel better, less guarded and more like a team. This was more information about their situation than she had received in the previous eight months. Maybe sex had been a really good idea.

Kirill continued, "I don't know if we will be safe, because I don't know why they are after us. I do know he will stop seeking us when the bounty deadline runs out."

She left that crucial question alone for now. "How do you know he is after you as well?"

"In Budapest, he came after me first. I am better and escaped. I followed him, and he led me to you."

"How do you know it is the Russian government that is after us?"

"It is not the Russian government, but the Siberian oil cartel. Alexei is family and only works for them. Oil is the biggest revenue industry, so the government uses the same fiscal year."

"How do you know Alexei is exclusive?"

"We were in school together. There were no secrets. If we didn't tell each other outright, we would hack into each other's private records and tell others."

"Assassin school?" She meant it mostly sarcastically.

"Yes."

Again she waited for some further explanation to take away the bluntness of that reply, something to bridge the distance between her naive American upbringing, career notwithstanding, and his deadly weaponhood. When she realized nothing further was forthcoming, she tried to cover her trepidation with a subject change. "So how did you know it's my birthday? It's not like I've used my real identity, although you seem to know it anyway."

His long fingers swept back her hair from her face and she knew she had not hidden her fear from him. When she felt him tilt his head up to look at her face, she closed her eyes, shutting out the smooth expanse of golden skin she had been admiring.

"Do not be afraid of me, Nee-cola. I will not hurt you."

He probably would, but that would not be his fault. Sex had never been casual with her, not last night or this morning, not with Jason, not with any of her short experiments in college and grad school. She opened her eyes, pushing up to straddle his thighs, and smiling down at him.

"I know. Let's get breakfast and go do something fun today. It is my birthday and since I don't have to wait around for my folks to call this year, we can go play."

His eyes stayed too perceptive although he gave her the sweet smile again. He sat up and put his arms back around her in a loose hug. "You knew that last night, Nee-cola." It was a question and statement in one, the truth of her panic attack last night.

She suddenly realized he had said her name, her real name, more times this morning than the whole rest of their time together. He already knew why she hurt and had done what he could to assuage it. It was not what she had wanted for her birthday, that was her family, but it was closer to what she basically needed than anything she could have thought reasonable - someone who knew her to acknowledge her as herself. She put her arms back around his neck and pressed her cheek to his, partly to hide again from his eyes, partly to press herself to his delicious length.

"Yes. Thank you for making it better."

"You are welcome." He chuckled darkly, "But I think I like your way of thanking me from last night better."

She laughed and shoved away from him, flouncing off the bed to find some clothes, feeling light, humor restored. "I do too. And maybe if you are very nice to me today, I'll find something else to thank you for."

She laughed again as he scrambled off the bed and out the door, shouting over his shoulder, "I'll start breakfast, Nee-cola. Hurry up!" This might actually turn out to be a good day.

* * *

><p><em>AN: Thanks to God Entity for reviewing Chapter 1. This is one of those pairings that just has a mind of its own rather than me manipulating them into some action, so I highly suspect there will be more. There might actually be a plot in future chapters as well._


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